Four Hours
by megustael izzard
Summary: Dr. House is caught in an elevator with an odd younger girl that he can't help but be vaguely interest in for an undisclosed amount of time. I'm horrible at summaries, but please, I would love some reviews despite that c: M for future chapters.
1. Chapter 1

There was no other kind of awkward like standing in an elevator with a person you don't know. You're sure you'll never see this person again, and yet, here you are with them, alone in a very small room for about twenty seconds. You both have a common goal, obviously, but no talking gets done. Two figures stood in a certain elevator, their eyes focused forward, never saying or doing anything to make the other think they were the least bit interested in talking. One was tall, not very sharply dressed, and was definitely without a razor. He wore a t-shirt from some local band under a jacket, as if he begrudgingly took any thought into his appearance this morning. Perhaps the most interesting thing about him was his cane, or the way he seemed to glare at the doors of the elevator, as if whatever was troubling him was their entire fault. And it certainly did look something was troubling him.

The second stood about a foot away from him. She was much shorter, and much younger. Her hair was dark and long, like a straight board down her back, glistening in the florescent light from up above either because she had a natural glow, or it'd been a few days since she showered. Her eyes were much darker than the man's, and almond-shaped, like her two Asian parents before, and no doubt their parents as well. She was also less clothed than he was. She, too, had a t-shirt and some junky old pair of jeans, but she also lacked a hat and scarf, unlike the man to her left. Her skin was somewhat darker and finer than his, no doubt putting her at fourteen or fifteen. There the two of them stood, and after a moment, there the two of them stumbled backward.

The elevator came to a sudden stop, causing them both to lurch backward. The florescent lights from above flickered for a moment, and then went off for an even longer moment. The younger girl's deep breathing filled the darkness around them, and the older man finally let out a short, annoyed sigh. "Three, two, one…" He mumbled, and the lights flickered back on again. With a look over to the other, he hobbled over to the phone, picked it up. "Yeah, time to wake up," He said to the other on the other end, no doubt a maintenance man. "The elevator's stuck, what do you think? Just me, and a visitor." And with that, he hung up violently, his blue eyes going over to the girl. He frowned curiously, as she seemed to be scrunched up, but he didn't say anything to her.

The silence continued for about twenty minutes, when the phone rang. When it did, the girl gasped but then let out a sigh of relief, which the older man interpreted as her thinking they could get off now. "House," He said, and then smirked. "Well, if it isn't funbags herself. Plan go awry? It's a shame this isn't you and me in the elevator. I got stuck with some…what?" He frowned, looking definitively angry. "Are you kidding me?" After a moment, the older man hung up, and made the first contact with the younger girl. "Sorry, it'll be a while," He said, and shrugged, leaning against the wall and popping an oblong, white pill into his mouth while a thankful look spread on his features. And then for the first time the younger girl actually spoke.

"How long is a while?" She asked him, and seemed to relax a little. When the man shrugged, she frowned, and she looked down to her lap. "What, minutes, hours…days?" She asked, and her eyes went wide.

"No, not days," House repeated with a roll of his eyes, not taking his gaze from the door ahead of him, almost trying to will it to open. He frowned down at her for just a moment, and shook his head. "Probably in a half an hour, that's what happened the last time this happened. Of course, it took them weeks to get the blood stains from the walls," He said, obviously just trying to bother her, but he seemed to have done much more than that. He frowned, watching her curl up once more, her breaths becoming deep and quick. "Look, it was a joke, there was no--." He stopped when he saw this was not alleviating the situation, and he couldn't help but roll his eyes, and bend down next to her.

It was then he noticed the one thing that separated a patient from a visitor. The blue, plastic bracelet that was wrapped around her wrist contained her name, age, doctor, and just about everything else that the man needed to calm her down. "Ji…" He began, and then frowned at her name. There was no way he was going to pronounce that, or even bother to try. "Foreign Named Girl, put your head between your legs and take slow, deep breaths," The man said, in probably the calmest and concerned tone, which came out to him just lowering his voice. As she worked on calming herself down, his eyes went over to the bracelet again. He smirked with reasons only know to him, and a very nervous hand went to her back. He attempted to soothe her, but only ended up with a firm grip on her back that was not helping. The girl's hand flew up and she palmed his shoulder, causing the man to fall into the wall a little, and away from her. He frowned, and would have hit her back, had she not been going through a full-blown panic attack.

The girl's eyes were wide and her face was getting redder, but gradually her breaths became normal. Only a few tears had fallen (thankfully for the other man), and she was no longer packed so tightly. She gulped, a bead of cold sweat coming down from her forehead. After a moment she closed her eyes, and gained a little more control over her breaths. She vaguely heard him ask if he could check her pulse, and she willingly offered him her wrist, which was riddled with brown scars. She was obviously no longer ashamed of them, the man had concluded, and he proceeded to take her pulse. "You're going to be fine," He continued. After scaring a man into stroking, he supposed scaring a girl into a panic attack was all right. He heard her breathing become almost normal, and he was almost surprised she spoke.

"Jinny," She said to him, her voice hoarse, her eyes kept down on her feet and the red draining from her face. "My name's Jinny. And your name's Dr. House," She continued, tracing circles idly on the ground, and seemed to concentrate on nothing else. In the corner of her eyes, she saw him looking around for a nametag he may be accidentally wearing, or whether his wallet was still in pocket. "Two strikes…" She said with a small smirk, barely visible. She felt his eyes on her, then, and she frowned, looking over to the opposite wall. After a moment, she continued. "Dr. Gregory House, a Board-Certified Diagnostician with a double specialty in infectious diseases and cardiology." Jinny frowned, then, and shook her head. "No, nephrology. The kidneys, not the heart…" She mumbled, mostly to herself. "Currently employed in Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital as Head of Diagnostics," She said, and then nodded.

House blinked. "How exactly…?" He asked, just staring at mostly her back and her somewhat greasy hair. "Well, I can't help but feel embarrassed. I mean, you've written a biography on me, and here I am with a name I can't pronounce," He said with a small shake of his head. How did she know all of them? He could see her smirking from back there, and it frustrated him greatly. Her behavior was not surprising, however. Given her doctor's name and the way she was dressed and unkempt, she was obviously a patient in the adolescent psychiatric wing. He couldn't diagnose anything just yet, however, as she'd barely said anything other than his American Medicine Association profile on the—He smirked. "The internet," He said to her, and he chuckled. "You looked me up on the internet? I'm surprised you went to the AMA website, there were so many cool porn sites you could have chosen."

"Good," Jinny said, as if she were just testing him. She moved a little towards his direction with a small chuckle, looking up and down his leg in the moments where he wasn't really paying attention. Her eyes seemed to go wide as she watched him, and she frowned a little when he did look down at her. She returned to facing away from him, her fingers flickering like she was playing a guitar, though it was obvious she was in thought. And then she laughed, which made the older man jump a little bit. He growled, and then he couldn't help but ask the question. "Why did you look me up on the internet?" He continued, his eyebrows rising as he looked over to her back.

Jinny sighed loudly and with a very frustrated tone before she answered his question. "Because the nurses were talking about you being in rehab once. Said your name, then they said that you were good. Real good. Wondered why you'd be there," She said quickly, and then frowned over to him, looking at his leg once more before she turned back around. "I mean, for addiction, obviously, but for…something…" And then her train of thought was lost. She was obviously focused on something else completely. Her fingers continued to trace the elevator floor while House watch her. She obviously got curious, he thought to himself. _But why that curious, to sneak onto the computer to just look for me? It wasn't logical for her to have known about this elevator incident._ He wanted to delve more into the thought when she said a word he knew only too well. "Infarction." His attention was now on her. "You have an infarction—h-had an infarction in your right leg," She continued.

House was not going to mask his shock. She had to be fourteen or fifteen, and not to mention he had never seen this girl in his life. How did she know about this? "You know, I normally try not to talk about my bum leg because it is, in fact, just a bum leg. But how the hell did you—!" He stopped when the bright red phone rang, and he rose up quickly, answering the phone with a small smirk. "Hello again, Cuddy. Say, just out of curiosity, have you ever been interested in phone sex?" He asked. "Or getting it on in an elevator? Cause this is probably a once in a lifetime opportunity to do both," He said with a laugh, though his eyes were still looking back down to the girl was now tracing circles, trying her best to get it just perfect. He looked back to the phone for a moment, and frowned down. "What do you mean, _hours_? That…that can't be right, put the mechanic on the phone. Put him on the damn phone!" There was a moment, and his yelling continued. "It takes you three to five hours to fix a--!" And then, he was silenced. "One of them is broken?" He seemed to be all ears, now. He nodded every once in a while, and then he shook his head, hanging up the phone after a while. He looked down at the younger girl who seemed to be interested in what was going on, but she gave no physical signs of interest. "Hours." She just repeated, and she shook her head, erasing her invisible circle with her palm before starting again. "Am I going to get to know, or am I just gonna sit here all day waiting for something to happen?" She asked, and then her eyes became a little wide. "Are we going to die?" There was no terror in her voice, but nor was there any sounds of happiness. It seemed to be genuine curiosity.

"One of the elevator cables is almost snapped. It's connected to the electrical wiring whatever, so when that snaps, so will the power," He explained grimly. "So they have to 'take extreme caution' in trying to fix it, but he's pretty sure the cable and electricity is going to snap."

"Who?"

"The electrician. And no, we're not going to die," He said in a bored kind of way, which didn't seem to bother Jinny. She had her circles, her squares, and the sound of her own breathing. She'd had less before, definitely. Not to mention the lights were still on, which mean that the air conditioner in the elevator was still working. She wasn't wearing much so she didn't have to take off when it did it overwhelmingly hot in there (which it would, that was just common sense), unlike Dr. House. She also had this man that she'd wanted to meet since she knew about him (thank goodness for gossiping nurses). And if he wouldn't talk to her, then she would still have her circles and squares.

"How did you know I had an infarction?"


	2. Chapter 2

The lights were beginning to flicker on and off, now, as the two sat there on the floor of the elevator. House had gotten comfortable but stretching his legs out in front of him, his cane sitting next to his legs, and he looked forward with such a concentrated stare that it began to give the other a headache. He reached into his pocket and took out a clear, orange bottle with which he was far too familiar. He shook it, and listened, deducing that he had about two left. Hesitantly but with such a thrust that it must have been forced, he swallowed the pill, and smirked to himself. "So," He said loudly, causing the young girl to jump slightly. "You still haven't answered my question. How do you know I had an infarction?" He asked her, and looked over. She was still hunched over and tracing on the floor, her tongue hanging out in concentration, and she seemed a little upset that he had interrupted her.

"It's easy," She said simply, and she sighed somewhat, now tracing what looked like a person. "An infarction is just a blood clot. Blood clots prevent the blood, the blood to get through to an area, obviously. You have muscle death because of the blood c-clot," She continued, and House just watched, almost fascinated. Almost. "Not a broken bone—no cast. Plus, no one buys a cast for a cane. Cane for a cast." She blinked a few times, and let out a small sigh.

"Could have been a pain in my foot. Plantar—."

"No. No foot pain," Jinny responded, and she continued to frown down at her person. Nothing could break her gaze with what she was tracing. "Too much pressure on your foot w-when you w-walk. Pain hits you when you step on your foot fully, meaning the pressure…goes up your leg," She said simply, and she shrugged. "Easy," She concluded, and she went back to tracing shapes, the tip of her index finger now a good shade of gray from all the dirt she was collecting, though she didn't seem to care that much. "My foster dad is a retired surgeon. Was," She corrected herself, and she pushed back some of her greasy hair, nodding and nodding, and she didn't seem to stop. "He has medical journals—I read them, I remember stuff," She continued, and she sighed. She went to move to lie on her stomach, wincing as she did, but for no particular reason. She just continued to trace.

House blinked a couple of times, and couldn't help but wonder why she knew all of this. And then he began to piece together what was all about her. "Look at me," He said to her, and she didn't move. He decided to try again. "Jinny, over here, look at me," He said, in the most non-threatening way, but she just ignored him. He saw her glance over once, and he sighed. "The lack of eye contact, the ability to retain information like that, the fact that you're in the foster system…" He smirked to himself. "You're a High-Functioning Autistic kid, aren't you?" He asked, and he saw the smile on her face as she nodded a few times. "See? That wasn't that impressive," He growled, the smile disappearing.

"Yes," Jinny replied, and she lifted her leg up and down behind her, her heel sometimes touching her thigh as she did. "I did not go to medical school for fifteen years," She replied matter-of-factly, and she continued to move her leg beat by beat, never really interrupting the beat. "Four plus four plus two fours equals sixteen years…" She mumbled mostly to herself, trying to calculate about how many years he'd actually been in medical school. "It doesn't take autism to retain information like that. W-would that make all doctors autistic?" She asked, but it seemed to be a rhetorical question, since she didn't even glance in his direction. Her speech was strained, like she was trying so hard to speak correctly, and she looked pretty proud of herself. She erased what she'd just drawn on the floor, sat up, and began to try and tug off her bracelet. She waited for House to stop her, but he didn't, which left her with a braceletless wrist. She stopped when the lights flickered off for a while, but then back on again, the buzzing of the fluorescents filling the silence in the room once more.

House found himself wanting to know more. Not a lot of autistic children were full of this much speech, and he knew he'd found a medical gem. Not to mention she had a high level of intelligence that wasn't uncommon, just not commonly spread. He frowned at her still, chuckling when she made a very good point about retaining information. He watched her struggle with her bracelet as long as he could, and he finally did sigh loudly. "You know, you'll be needing that when this thing gets fixed, so don't…" He didn't see the point in continuing, she understood. He glanced down at the bracelet, then, wanting to know more. "What put you in the hospital?" He asked her.

Without hesitation, she came back with her own question. "Why do you wanna know?"

House wasn't surprised. "I guess I'm just curious."

"I was curious too. I f-figured it out. You're not dumb," Jinny said simply, undoing and redoing her bracelet once she had figured out to. She felt his eyes on her still, and she wished he would stop, but she didn't blame him. She was sometimes a curious thing.

House chuckled. "Fair enough," He said, and he began to mentally deduce why she may be in here. "Your bracelet says you're in the east wing of the psychiatric unit, which is the long-term wing, so you're not a first-timer, because you're not insane," He said to her, sighing. "You're in foster care, which means your parents messed you up big time when you were younger," He continued, and he thought about it for a moment, sighing softly. "Your obvious choice of suicide is to cut yourself, but none of those scars are fresh at all. I'd say it's been about two years since you last cut your wrists, anyway, who knows how many you have on you," He said with a frown.

"You have three questions," Jinny said to him with a small shrug.

House nodded slowly, thinking hard about these questions. "And one can't be 'Why are you in the hospital?', can it?" He asked, and she shook her head over and over again, leading him to nod. He leaned against the elevator door, bouncing his cane on the dusty ground, and he ruffled up his hair somewhat as he considered three questions. They'd obviously be questions he could deduce from, and not just random questions that could go anywhere. No, those were questions Chase asked. He looked down at her, finally coming up with a question. "What happened with your parents?" He finally asked, looking nothing but curious as he looked down at her.

Jinny thought about this question for a moment. "Mom died. D-dad's in jail," She said simply, and when he pressed for no, she shook her head. "No, no, you asked what happened. That's what happened," She said, all the while still shaking her head back and forth. She could almost hear him thinking, and it made her smirk to know that he was having such a difficult time with all of this, while it took her all of three minutes to figure him out. His AMA page didn't hurt, though.

House racked his brain for another question. For the purposes of this thought process, he was going to say that her father was in jail for the same reason her mother was dead. He sighed, and he looked around the room to think, wishing he had his large ball to toss around. And then it hit him. He was missing General Hospital. "What's another one of your diagnoses—besides autism? A psychiatric diagnosis," He said to her quickly, not wanting to make that mistake. Not now while she was still ahead.

Jinny thought about this answer for a while. On one hand, she wanted to tell him the vaguest disorder—unipolar disorder—but then on the other hand, she wanted to give him some kind of clue. She let out a very frustrated sigh, and she laid down on her stomach once more, twirling her bracelet in the air above her as she thought about her answer. "Generalized Anxiety Disorder," She responded with a small chuckle. It was not the most vague, but it may as well have been, and this was what made the smirk appear on her thick lips.

House rolled his eyes. "Isn't that a staple for you people?" He asked rudely, leaving her to giggle. He shook his head. "Fine, fine, that was your answer…" He said to her. All of this was obvious. She obviously had panic attacks, though. Could she have blacked out, and attacked someone out of fear? Murder obviously ran through her veins. That would be the most interesting answer, he thought to himself, and he chuckled. She seemed the wound-up type who would easily snap, and would definitely have the means to do so. "Alright, I have my last question. Have you ever--."

"No," Jinny replied firmly. "You already asked three questions." When House went to protest, which she knew he would, she interrupted him. "My parents, my diagnosis, and the fact that it can't be…you can't ask why I'm here," She said quickly and very proudly, considering she had just made him lose. "My game, my rules. You're playing my game, y-you're following my rules," She said to him simply, and would not believe anything else he said. She looked to the corner of her eye and saw him smirking, despite his protesting. She knew he would like her. "But you wanna know why I'm here, still?" She asked him, and she didn't have to look over to see him nod. She began to write something on the ground, her body rocking back and forth slightly as she did, and she sighed slightly. "Making threats is wrong, but I made a th-threat. At my school. Told someone I would kick their ass," She said with a chuckle, and she shook her head. "So they took me here, for the fifth time. Not west-wing psych either. I've been here a month."

"They didn't arrest you?" House asked, and saw her smile broadly.

"Y-you should know as well as I that us handicaps are a-almost immune from the law," Jinny said with a laugh, and House even joined in. As their laughter began to wind down, the lights flickered off for a while, and never really did come back at all.

After a moment, Jinny's breaths were deep but not quick, so House could only conclude she was preventing another panic attack by taking control. "Ooh, suck it up, it's just the dark," He said to her with a roll of his eyes, and then he closed his eyes. "Close your eyes. You'll damage them if you try and see in the darkness like this," House advised, and heard a very stuffy sigh from across the elevator.

"I _know_."


	3. Chapter 3

((sorry about my lack of writing D: things sudden got busy. if you liked it, i'd love reviews, so i know i'm not writing to no one D: ))

It felt like hours since the lights went off. The girl had been silent the entire time, no doubt trying to keep herself from going into yet another panic attack. "I assume you're afraid of the dark or something, right?" House had asked sarcastically not too long, and she replied by letting out a grunt. He tapped his cane on the floor, his eyes closed gently as he did, and he frowned slightly. He hated closing his eyes, because he saw her face. It was so pretty…it always had been. Her hair, too, those dark locks that framed her face in such a way that sent chills up his spine. He'd loved her for a long time; he loved her for too long. He felt it weighing down on him like he was carrying around a two-ton animal on his back. It was so much, and it was constantly there, constantly. It was just worse when his eyes closed. As he continued to think about her and her pretty face, he heard the girl stir for the first time in a while. He heard her fingertip roll across the dusty floor, no doubt tracing more shapes or other objects. And then he smiled slightly, hearing his love's voice in his ear, vaguely. He let out a sigh that sounded oddly like a groan, and he sighed somewhat, running a hand through his thinning grey hair. He really hated himself most of the time.

In an instant the emergency phone rang once more, scaring the girl and him, though he didn't gasp nearly as loud as she did. He rose up with a wince, and he hobbled over to the phone, taking it off the hook quickly. "What?" He asked, habitually answering most phones like that. Dr. Cuddy's voice was on the line, and she sounded very worried. He stopped her in the middle of her explanation. "Woah, woah, shut up Cuddy," He said simply. "Are we even safe?" He winced at her answer, and he shook his head. "Right, right. No, just a…a visitor," He lied, though he wasn't sure why. "Yes, stop worrying. You have enough grey hairs." And he hung up the phone. "Alright, listen, Foreign Name Girl--"

"Jinny."

"Don't care. Listen. They have to go ahead and snap the cable because they need to control what happens after that, alright?" He asked almost angrily, standing there in front of her vague figure. "So just hold tight. We're not going to go flying or falling, don't worry. If there's one thing I trust about this hospital, it's the maintenance staff," He grumbled, and he sat down in his previous spot, letting out a shaky sigh and checking his pocket for vicodin. "Meanwhile, I hope you're enjoying your time, because I'm out of pain pills," He mumbled.

"You know, six-sixty percent of pain is caused by addiction itself. Detox pain is a lot worse than actual pain, cause y'know, cause there's to do about it but get through it," Jinny explained, though she was sure he already knew this. She let out a gentle sigh, sitting up against the wall as she did, and she looked up to the ceiling. She waited for the silence to envelope the room before she opened her mouth to speak once more. "You know what?" She began with a small chuckle. "Th-that's not why I was put in the hospital for the fifth time," She mumbled to him, and she vaguely felt his eyes glaring down at her. "I just w-wanted to see if you'd believe me. And you did. I win," She said with a small giggle.

House rolled his eyes. "That doesn't make you a winner, Girl. It just means you have mythomania. Which isn't surprising, really, considering the list of disorders I'm sure they've given you because your dad offed your mom," He mumbled off-handishly, and he heard her giggling.

"Don't have th-that one, Greg," She said, which she hoped irritated him. "No, I didn't do it just to do it, or to impress you. I-I was just curious if you'd believe me. Why would you b-believe me, Dr. House?" She asked him with a small chuckle, and she pushed back some of her hair gingerly, her eyes still closed because of the almost complete darkness. "Or d'you just like crazy people?" Jinny asked.

House didn't bother hiding his frown. He really couldn't say why he believed her…everybody lies, right? He frowned still, his eyes finally sliding to a close once more. Why would he believe her, someone who would have that excuse to lie? Her inability to interact with other people to this degree would make her want to try harder, and that probably means lying. But she just didn't seem the type to want to do that. She seemed like she really didn't care what people thought about her, despite her probably having no one except for her ex-surgeon foster father and whatever amount of foster kids they were piling on him. He then let out a chuckle. "Well, I just didn't expect you to have to capacity to want to actually lie," He said, perhaps a little meanly, but he didn't care. This bothered him. He knew why he believed her, but he didn't even want to admit it to himself. It was stupid to think that it actually mattered.

"Ooh," Jinny mumbled, and she sighed. "I'll just assume you like crazy people, then. Y-you seem the kind to, y'know. People don't like you," She said simply, just stating a fact. "The nurses especially. But I know why people don't like you. Not cause you're mean, or…I-I mean, it's part of the reason, but I know the reason why y-you're so mean to people. You're just more up front with your craziness." And then she giggled lightly. "Cause y'know, Dr. House, everyone is crazy. Most people are just better at hiding it. Think about what people you do know, however little the number is. You could p-probably pick out their crazy easier than most people." She grinned to herself, pleased with the way she was speaking.

House wrinkled his nose, and he found himself begrudgingly thinking about all of this. Wilson's crazy was very obvious; he needed people to need him. He'd pointed that out a while ago. And Cuddy, well she was a control freak and she enjoying bearing the weight of the entire world. House knew she often buckled under that pressure, and yet she did it any way. That was the definition of insanity; repeating the same action and expecting different results was Cuddy's specialty. Cameron, he decided, was the most messed up in his life, surprisingly more than Wilson. He'd heard of people buying houses that needed a lot work, because she literally tried to get with a House that needed a lot of work to it. He rolled his eyes from behind his eyelids. She enjoyed a project. Chase had a problem with being told what to do, of course, evidently by father figures especially. Foreman was unfortunately a lot like House himself. House let out a tiny, almost inaudible chuckle, then. "You know what I think, Girl?"

"Hmm?"

"I think you've been spending too much time with shrinks," House grumbled, and he leaned back against the wall more. He hated the fact that this girl got him to seriously think about what she said. Who else could do that to him? No one was the answer. He sighed loudly and annoyingly. "So, why are you in the hospital then? And no, I don't wanna play your stupid twenty questions game. I'm through with games. You got me, I'm genuinely curious about why you were in here."

"Ooh, Dr. House, I never meant for you to be g-genuinely curious about me," Jinny began, and then she sighed. "Alright, then, fine, if you have to know, I will tell you. I'm in here because I attempted suicide for the third t-time or so. I'm usually really good at things, so I dunno why I'm bad at suicide," Jinny said with a shake of her head. "I took some of my antipsychotics. Well, I took too many. A foster kid got to me in time, though…I suppose I should stop tempting the fates like this, even though it's kind of what I want in the first place. I-I have autism, and p-people expect me to be alright with that?" She asked with a very calm and even voice, as if she were talking about the weather to him. She had obviously had this conversation before. "I'm going to t-try again soon enough. Not any time soon…I suppose I-I'd like to at least experience college before I try and commit suicide. I-I've always been interested in medicine, actually, believe it or not."

"Well, you've been around it enough. Shame there can't be an autistic doctor. Where do you think you'll be without that all-important human connection? You can't do that," He said, wanting to see how far he could push her, but he didn't seem to be doing any damage, because she began to hum lightly. "You do have the smarts, but you're like a computer. Cold, unfeeling, logical and factual. You don't have the capacity to be a doctor when it comes to emotions." He smirked. "I got a friend with plenty of emotions. Maybe you can borrow his."

That got her to react, unfortunately, but not in the way he expected. "Y'know, Dr. House, y-you're probably right. I-I might go into research," She mumbled, though she did sound a little upset. Jinny shifted slightly, and let out a tiny sigh. "But you know, that sounds a lot like you. J-just from what I know f-from you, of course," Jinny added, and she couldn't help but smile at herself. "H-have you ever tried to off yourself? After the first f-few times, it becomes a little unsurprising, y-y'know." She let out a tiny sigh, and then an even tinier laugh. "W-when you been so close to d-death, then life almost s-seems…obsolete," She explained with a small nod, and then another, and another, all to herself.

House sighed. "Yeah," He just agreed, and he put his head down. "I guess that makes some sense. Which is odd for a nutjob," He said, having to put something in there. Of course he'd tried to off himself. Maybe not as consciously as she did, but he'd been on the brink of death before. He opened up his bottle subconsciously, and then when he found no pills, he ran his finger along the insides of the bottle before rubbing the dust onto his gums. "Want some?" He offered, and he felt the bottle being taken from his hands, and she put it back after a moment.

"You know, I do have some xanex. I've been k-keeping some," She began. "I-it's a small dose, b-but it does the tri—." She stopped when the elevator gave a quick lurch downward, and she felt it swing quickly from side to side. Her eyes went as wide as dinner plates, and she let out a shaky sigh. "How long will we be dangling like this?" She asked with a small cry.

"Don't know," House replied, looking a little bit shaken up. "But I'm going to need that xanex."


End file.
